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Champagne buckets glistened beneath a full moon on the upper terrace of Pure, a South Beach hideout for has-beens, as break dancers popped, locked, and spun in the green and purple glow of electroluminescence. It was the nether region between Saturda...

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The great rock n roll swindle continues! Music-journalist sheep still hold to their claim that were in the middle of a rock n roll revival. Nonsense. Rock n roll would first have to go away in order to be revived, and anyone can tell you tha...

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The cover of Hard Times for Dreamers, the first full-length release from See Venus, is a collage of blue-hued buildings stacked on top of one another, stretching across a twinkling cityscape. And the music mirrors that simple cinematic elegance wi...

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As Mo' Wax label chief and main conspirator behind the intriguing UNKLE project, James Lavelle has already carved a successful path for himself as entrepreneur and producer. In between day jobs, though, it seems he can't shake his roots, which lie be...

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Ani DiFranco might be the Johnny Cash of her generation -- an innovative and independent musician haunted by heartbreak, indignation, and talent. After Evolve admitted DiFranco's personal need to do just that, she "suited up for the long walk back to...

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It doesn't get much catchier than the collage of infectious hooks the Wrens present on The Meadowlands. That's not to say there's anything facile about the New Jersey quartet's long-awaited follow-up to 1996's Secaucus. Rather, its latest pastes a k...

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If you hear something you don't like on Tripping Tropicana, the first U.S. release from Colombian rockers Superlitio, just wait a second. Even in this era of global musical promiscuity, the sextet from Cali is remarkably wanton with genres and moods....

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After months of drooling anticipation, Liars have unloaded a large, mysterious object into the dying fire of pretentiousness. And while it is moderately intriguing to hear those flames crackle again, it is doubtful either fans or haters expected a so...

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It's not uncommon at a major record label's headquarters to see a hip, bald man in his late 30s cleaning out his cubicle. In his four years as a business analyst at Universal Music, Rob Coe has seen more than 200 people pink slipped and escorted from...

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In 1984, David Lowery was the primary songwriter, guitarist, and lead singer of the newly formed Camper Van Beethoven. In 1994, he was the primary songwriter, guitarist, and lead singer of Cracker. In 2004, he is the primary songwriter, guitarist, a...

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"What kind of music is it?"
"I dunno, kinda like emo-ish hardcore."
OK, for serious. That was an excerpt from an actual conversation between two kids behind me at Publix. Now, this is only my second column, but I'm going to declare that after t...

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Go-go music was Washington, D.C.,'s contribution to the world of funk during the late '70s and early to mid-'80s. It burst on the scene as complete party music, with slower tempos and a premium placed on crowd interaction. Hardly song-based, this was...

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In terms of Detroit garage-punk street cred, Mick Collins is more bulletproof than a horde of flesh-eating zombies. The Stooges and the MC5 may have introduced blistering scuzz-rock to the Motor City, but the singer-guitarist almost single-handedly r...

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This has been touted as the year's most anticipated release -- less because of what Kanye West has achieved as half of Roc-A-Fella's hit-making house production team and more because of what he represents: the long-awaited bridge between hip-hop's ov...

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With the latest in the Blue Series Continuum -- a conceptual pairing of nonjazz artists with famed New York pianist Matthew Shipp and his talented cohorts -- El-P has whipped up another stimulating recording. This time, though, the intellectual rappe...

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Air makes great softcore-porn music. At least seven of the ten songs on the new album Talkie Walkie could back the drawn-out, slow-motion sex scenes to those old, dubbed-in-English Emmanuelle skin flicks and, in some of those instances, actually impr...

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Sometimes, the heckler is right. Many moons ago, a young Millie Jackson wrecked some poor tuneless hackette's act in the famed Harlem nightclub, Small's Paradise. The would-be diva dared Jackson on-stage. Oops! After dusting the object of her ridicul...

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An acoustic version of the Misfits Last Caress right next to a trippy Massive Attack-ified space-pop spinout, followed by an ode to Robert Stack? One word: Finally! The man behind the music is Timb, a Boca Raton singer/songwriter/guitarist whose a...

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Watching middle-aged men and women dance is an experience akin to watching your friend get his ass kicked by a midget at a county fair -- it's a bit sad but also totally hilarious. Watching them bump and grind after they've imbibed six gin and tonics...